What Time Can Heal
by the49thname
Summary: December, 1945. Four months had passed since the world had been gripped in terror and destruction but now it was time for celebration, for quiet nights by warm firesides and drinks on balconies overlooking cities no longer burning. Nyotalia!FrUK for the FrUK Entente Cordiale Event 2015.


Hey! It's been a while, sorry ;;; Uni's kept me really busy but I really wanted to take part in a FrUK event on tumblr, and this is for that event! I hope you like it and let me know what you think.

**Fandom:** Hetalia

**Pairing:** France/England

**Song the fic was written to:** Postmodern Jukebox's rendition of Blank Space

**Warnings:** Mild sexual themes

* * *

December, 1945. Four months had passed since the world had been gripped in terror and destruction, since Alice could breathe without her body screaming in protest, since Marianne was rescued bleeding and broken from a Nazi prison cell in occupied Paris. But now, months later, it was a time for celebration, for quiet nights by warm firesides and drinks on balconies overlooking cities no longer burning. They were still shaken, yes, for even the blissful forgetfulness centuries of living provided you could never erase the horrifying memories of those six dreadful years. Yet despite the healing wounds they were capable of wearing ball gowns and makeup, of smiling and laughing once more. And so, on this snowbound day of December, they stood encased in satin and chiffon holding champagne in crystal glasses, backs pressed against wood-panelled walls in a candle-lit hall.

It had been Amelia's idea, as it usually was; she had regained her love of parties and money spending as of late, which the Depression and Great Wars had all but taken from her. She stood nearby, laughing at a terrible joke her ambassador had told, pearls glinting in the candlelight amongst the black satin of her gown. It brought a smile to Alice's face, although the usual bitterness still remained - no amount of years could _ever_ make her forget that rain-filled night of betrayal and loneliness and words that pained her heart for _you used to be so great_ \- but nothing, not even her memories, would dampen her spirits that night. Her boss had encouraged her to go in an effort for them to get to know each other - Churchill had lost the 1945 election and instead a charming man named Attlee had taken over since July, though she still wasn't sure on some of his policies - and for some much needed enjoyment amongst the recovery and rebuilding the end of wars brought with them, and lord there was much of that to do. Parts of her beloved London were still in ruins - it was not quite as bad as when it was claimed by fire and flame, though Alice couldn't say she minded the end of the Plague all that much - and many other parts of her land besides. But she could feel it deep in her bones, with every breath and every word, that her people were recovering and there was _hope_ once more. The drudgery that had swallowed her and her people up for the past few decades was being lifted, slowly but surely, to be replaced with a newfound hope for the future albeit tinged with fear; what was to come would be something no-one, not even her and her immortal years, could predict.

"Stop thinking so much. You always frown like that when you do that, _ma chérie_."

"I wasn't frowning."

Still, paranoid, she rubbed a gloved finger between her eyebrows - they were not that thick, thank you very much - and sent a glare towards her smirking companion.

"You are here to relax and enjoy yourself, not think about troublesome thoughts. Now come away from that horrible shadowy corner and _dance_ with me."

She would have refused, purely on the principle that it would be a cold day in hell when she backed down to France, but a cherry-tinted smile and eyes that glinted with both amusement and the sort of stubbornness she had long since taken to mean no would not be taken for an answer, led her, somewhat apprehensively, away from the shadows to the brightly lit dancefloor, polished to perfection and glinting with flickering candle flame and the shadows of enamoured dancers. She also, though she would never say it aloud, had not seen Marianne smile like that in a very _very_ long time - it was the day they signed their alliance, in fact, the papers that forever pledged them to no longer war with each other, although it wouldn't quite be reality if they stopped fighting altogether - and those lips _certainly_ were enticing.

And so she was swept quite literally off her feet, a gloved hand at her waist, a widening smirk as she landed somewhat haphazardly on unsteady feet. She glared, pouting, but the laughter she received in return warmed her heart. Moving a hand to chiffon-encased hips, the other to gently hold a gloved hand, they began to move in time to a slow jazz number, trumpets and piano and a sultry voice accompanying the quiet shuffle of feet upon floorboards, the swish of dresses and clinking of glasses. Alice felt stiff somehow - perhaps all those years amongst the military had rid her of any feminine grace - but Marianne? She was graceful grandeur, long skirts and lightly curled hair, gloved hands on chiffon-encased hips. Compared to her, what was she? An air of regality she supposed, prim posture and pursed lips, but behind that was the half-wild lost girl of ages past still clinging to the skirts of others with wide forest green eyes.

Yet here, feet twirling above polished floorboards, she felt as light as air and as if she were taken hold of by a spirit and grace she rarely felt and it was _wonderful_. The lightest embrace on her hips, the soft music encasing them in a candle-lit dreamlike state of bliss, a growing smile on cherry-tinted lips - somehow it didn't _feel_ at all like a winter's evening in snowbound 1945; it was years long since passed, balls and dresses of silk and satin and the sound of a violin's quiet love song in the background of moonlit secret kisses in palace gardens, and as she was swept back through the centuries that smiling face seemed both ancient and eternally youthful for she knew every line and crease of it, knew every single part of those hands for they had held her hips in soft sensual embraces and the slightest of tension-filled touches, felt every inch of her until she could bring forth the memory of those moments far far too easily with memories that warmed her body at night and left her clutching at bedsheets with teeth-bitten lips. Somehow despite the shift and change of the years, despite the age clinging to every bone of her body until she felt ready to collapse from it, despite everything that had _ever_ happened between the two of them somehow none of it_ mattered_, for in this moment they were not England and France, they were not nations clinging with bloodied fingertips to an immortality they had never asked for - they were lovers, lips meeting on a dimly lit dancefloor, fingers entwined in a moment that was both eternal and transient, everything else be damned. Whether the end came today or tomorrow or never at all, this moment with those elegant hands held within her own, the warm breath caressing her cheek and the soft sensual words whispered into her ear - they were all that mattered, even if by tomorrow she would return to the bitterness-tinged jealousy that put so much distance between them. For now, if only for a moment, they were close and she was drinking it in like an alcoholic savouring the scent of wine after years spent sober and she was never going back, never returning to the nights spent alone in loneliness and silence and damnation.

As her heart fluttered, breath hitching, eyes widening as her entire being swelled with an emotion she had not felt in _decades_, their gazes met and in one swiftly passing moment those ocean blue eyes said _I want you_.

And she was gone, lost to the tide of the feeling building like a tidal wave within her, and turning swiftly with a hand in her own she pulled them away from the crowd, away from the judgemental glances and muttered comments behind gloves hands, and outside into the softly falling snow. Laughter burst forth unbidden, feet soon freezing in heeled shoes that did nothing to protect her bare skin from the bitter cold outside, yet the hand in hers was warm and the amused smile on Marianne's lips was intoxicating and she _loved_ how her heart skipped a beat over it, how her stomach flipped at the _idea_ of those lips on hers once more. It was like falling in love for the first time without the anxiety and worry of a lack of reciprocity, and yet it felt more like returning to arms and lips and words that she had loved and hated in equal measure for too many years to count - it felt like falling in love again swiftly and deeply and she had forgotten how giddy it left her, how it left her heart reeling with the intensity of it all. It was frightening how deeply these moments were marked upon her heart for she had always felt things too much, too strongly, and it had left her ruined and weeping bitterly in lonely dark places with no comfort far too many times. And yet she could be no other way, she could not _feel_ any other way, and if she was doomed to remain on this infernal seesaw of emotional intensity then so be it - so be it if she could have one more moment like this, perfect in its imperfections and in the way it clutched at her heart with both nostalgia and hope for something new, if that were even possible for them after all these millennia.

And so they walked, hand-in-hand, in snowbound beautiful silence.

The apartment was boiling in comparison to the bitter cold outside, and the heat flooding through their freezing limbs was bliss. Chiffon shawls and frost-encrusted heels were left abandoned by the front door as two shivering bodies stumbled towards the fireplace and open fire - Marianne's servant had most likely lit it in precedence to their return home - and so they sat side-by-side and let the warmth envelop them. They spent many minutes like this as the comforting light of the fire illuminated an otherwise pitch black room, with only the sound of the nearby grandfather clock - gifted by Alice many many years ago in a moment of apology, to which Marianne said she would throw it into the sea but never got round to doing, or so the excuse went - and the quiet whistle of the winter wind to permeate the silence surrounding them.

As moments passed tension grew, the sort of tension that was addictive in how it left you shaking and _needing_ and all it took was one glance and the soft whisper of her name and Alice was lost, fingers entwining in chestnut hair and lips meeting lips with a passionate intensity that left her _reeling_. Gentle glove-encased fingers drifted to her hips and held them as if they were made for this purpose, and as she fell backwards the cold of the wooden floorboards dimmed in comparison to the heat of Marianne's body above her own. She was burning under chiffon-softened touches and gentle kisses, coming apart as hands slipped under her dress and soft sighs were breathed into her neck. Her fingers found purchase in chestnut curls and she _relished_ the way Marianne's back arched as she pulled tightly. It was a game, a battle fuelled by lust instead of want for blood, and she would not break first, for she had a track record to keep after all, and she knew exactly how to render her most dear enemy into a wreck of shivering limbs and half-lidded eyes and bitten-back moans. She slid gloved fingers slowly and purposefully along her back, remembering every curve and crevice as she went, before trailing down the backs of trembling thighs and up to -

"A-ah take the gloves off first, y-you'll ruin the satin."

Silence, then quiet laughter.

"_Incredible_. Only _you_ would care about such a thing, you idiot."

Yet her snide insult meant nothing as she left a soft kiss on cheeks burning from embarrassment, as she pulled the satin away from her fingers slowly, enticingly, taking her time.

"And only you could make taking a glove off into a strip tease."

"Oh? But you love it really, _my dear_."

Marianne shivered and it had little to do with the now bare fingers drifting under her dress and up her thighs, for pet names never ceased to make her stomach flip, and the way her lips parted and eyes fluttered closed and the quiet moan she gave in reply were all the fuel Alice needed to continue her ministrations. But as she began to pull on the zip of Marianne's dress she felt her freeze, back stiffening. Alice frowned for something was _wrong_ somehow, and as she moved her hands away, fretting over what she had done wrong and mind filling with worry, Marianne gently took her hands and held them in her own, gaze downcast, hair falling softly forward and obscuring her face.

"Perhaps I… am now quite as ready as I thought. I'm… sorry…"

For a brief moment Alice sat in confused silence, frowning, for this was not like Marianne at all. In fact she had only been like this once before after the Revolution and -

Suddenly it made sense, and with a quiet sigh she pulled her lover into a soft embrace, gently stroking her hair. Embarrassment rose, for tenderness was a quality she was often lacking in, but it would have to be pushed aside and dealt with later for the woman in her arms was shaking, fingers digging into Alice's back. Marianne had always hated scars, despised them in fact, and Alice would never forget the way Marianne cried in her arms when she found her, curled up in a shadowed corner of her home in Paris, neck bandaged and the words _Madam Guillotine_ muttered between each sob. The thought of what exactly had happened during her time with Germany and Prussia left a bitter taste in Alice's mouth, and though anger burned in the pit of her stomach she was too tired to confront them for what good would more fighting do them now in the wake of so much anger and pain.

Moments passed.

Eventually Marianne moved away, pulling off a glove and wiping her eyes and face with a hand. She avoided Alice's gaze, looking pensive and ashamed, arms curling around her middle. They stayed like this for a while, Alice nervously picking at her nails - a bad habit of hers - and Marianne sat in stony silence staring at the fire. Tension grew between them and the urge to get up and leave crossed Alice's mind more than once - this tension usually arose after their numerous arguments, and leaving cleared her head and gave Marianne space to do the same - but, somehow, the fragility of the woman by her side and the remnants of that all-consuming emotion from earlier left her unable to leave, and though she would no doubt regret it she stood, sighing, taking Marianne by the hand and pulling them towards the bedroom.

"Ah Alice I don't -"

"Be quiet and lie down."

"B-but the dress will get creased."

"That is why irons exist, now _lie down_."

Marianne had heard that tone many a time and knew better than to disagree - it was the tone she had heard so often when Alice was revelling in the glory and power of her empire, feathered captain's hat atop blonde curls, green eyes glinting with challenge - and so she lay down, facing away from her companion, burying her hands under a cold pillow. She felt the bed dip as Alice lay down beside her and felt her back stiffen, fingers clutching at bedsheets, but as warm hands wrapped themselves around her waist and soft lips gently kissed her neck she relaxed, eyes closing.

If moments like earlier were rare, with all the emotional intensity that characterised their relationship from beginning to end, moments like _this_ were even rarer. It was quiet tenderness, a soft and gentle love that left them both vulnerable and they knew better than to enjoy these moments, for too much had happened between them and there were some things even time could not fix. And yet, despite it all, they were still capable of being like this together, of showing love and care and gentle tenderness to each other, and that was enough.

That was enough.


End file.
